


Invincible

by CuriousThimble



Series: Anders and FemHawke Shorts [5]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 03:19:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15403800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CuriousThimble/pseuds/CuriousThimble
Summary: Anders is surprised when Fenris walks into his clinic carrying a sick and miserable Hawke.





	Invincible

Anders looked up in confusion when he saw Fenris carrying Hawke into the clinic. “Is she hurt?” he asked, panic making his voice tight. In the year since they’d returned from the Deep Roads, he and Hawke had made up excuses to see one another on an almost regular basis. He knew that he could never have anything serious with her, but just being around her, making her laugh when he could muster up his old humor, and soaking up her flirtation were the highlight of his days. It made the nights he couldn’t sleep for thinking about her almost bearable.

 

Never would he have imagined to see her show up quite like this, however.

 

“No,” Fenris said flatly, coming closer. “Her manservant, Bodhan, came running to my mansion, telling me that she was sick and had left her house. By the time I caught up with her, she was delirious and staggering through Lowtown. It was closer to come here than to take her home.”

 

Anders nodded, and lead the way to the small room at the back. “Bring her back here,remember a bed she can lay on.”

 

“Why can’t she lay on one out here?” Fenris asked, jerking his chin toward one of the empty clinic cots. 

 

“She’s Hawke, that’s why.”

 

Fenris shrugged and followed the mage, carrying her easily. “I’m surprised she doesn’t weigh more,” he mused. “She’s strong, and strength is heavy. She eats like a goat.”

 

“Maybe you’re just stronger than you think,” Anders said distractedly, clearing off his narrow bed. “Put her here.”

 

Fenris did as he said, looking around the cramped room. “Do you live here as well?”

 

“I do,” Anders replied, taking her face in his hands. She was barefoot, in nothing but trousers and a loose shirt, very unlike the Hawke he knew. “She’s burning up. I wonder why she didn’t send Bodhan for me sooner?”

 

“Perhaps she thought it only a cold,” Fenris said helpfully, sitting on a crate in the corner. “I can’t imagine she’d come bother you unless it was serious.”

 

“What do you call this, Fenris?” he asked sharply, gesturing to the flushed young woman unconscious in his bed.

 

“Unfortunate.”

 

Anders sighed and patted her cheek to wake her. Hawke’s lashes slowly fluttered, then opened to reveal her lovely blue eyes. “Hello there, sweetheart,” he said gently, brushing her hair off her forehead and giving her a rueful smile. “You could have just come to visit, you know. You didn’t need to go to all this trouble.”

 

“Anders,” she sighed. A coughing fit took her, her entire body convulsing with the power of it. The sound is so rough and raw that he winces for her.

 

Anders reached behind him for some water and held the cup to her lips. “Slowly,” he advised, holding her shoulders up. “Why didn’t you send for me?” he asked when she’d lain back and caught her breath.

 

She shrugged, clearly exhausted. Anders shook his head and turned away, going to his work table and beginning to mix a potion. “This will help the cough and bring the fever down,” he explained, focusing on careful measurements. 

 

“Why not just use magic to heal her?” Fenris asked suspiciously. “I’ve seen you do it for people here.”

 

“Because Hawke is a generally healthy young woman,” Anders explained. “She can fight off a cold or simple auge. Most of these people don’t have healthy diets, or a safe place to recuperate. I’d rather let her fight it off herself than use magic.”

 

He smiled at Fenris’s grunt of approval. “I must say, I am surprised to hear that.”

 

“It’s what’s best for the body,” Anders explained. “Magical healing should be a final resort. For a healthy person like Hawke, she just needs a little help.”

 

“I’m right here,” she croaks, eyes closed.

 

“And I suppose you feel terrible, don’t you?” Anders asked, turning back with a clay cup in his hands. “Like you’ve been kicked in the chest, cold all over, and a little dizzy?”

 

She nods, groaning at the movement. “My neck hurts,” she adds, wincing.

 

Anders nods and helps her sit up again. “Drink up,” he ordered, holding the cup to her lips. “You’ll feel sleepy, don’t bother trying to fight it.”

 

Hawke’s nose wrinkled at the taste, and she grimaced as he lays her back down. “Andraste’s ass that’s terrible,” she rasped.

 

He only chuckled and left a cup of water by the bedside, then went out into the clinic to care for the rest of his patients, most of them suffering the same symptoms. It was difficult to focus, knowing she was sleeping in his bed, her scent- lavender, an unexpected floral that contradicted the sharp edges of her- seeping into his pillow to torment him in the small hours of the night.

 

When he’d finally emptied the clinic and closed the doors, he went to check on her. “Still sleeping?” he asked Fenris.

 

The elf hadn’t left, as Anders thought he would. Instead, he had merely sat in the corner with one knee against his chest and his eyes closed. Slowly he uncurled, stretching one leg out at a time and cracking his knuckles. “Yes.”

 

“Still coughing? I couldn’t hear anything from the front,” he added, putting a hand to her forehead.

 

“A little. Earlier she woke and complained of a headache.”

 

Anders nodded and turned back to his work table, making some note in a book he kept. “She can stay here tonight,” he told Fenris, counting potion bottles. “Getting her back to Hightown would be difficult at this hour.”

 

“I got her here well enough.”

 

Anders looked over at Fenris, raising an eyebrow. “Still, I want to be able to check on her.”

 

“Are you two having sex?” Fenris asked suddenly.

 

Anders dropped the bottle in his hand, cursing when the potion spills all over the table. “Andraste’s flaming tits!” he swore, mopping at it with a nearby rag. “What gives you that idea?”

 

“I am not blind,” Fenris said. “Anyone can see the way you stare at her. She is a beautiful woman, and she knows it.”

 

“I do  _ not _ stare at her.”

 

“You do. And she watches you when you’re not looking. You two have been dancing around one another for more than a year. If you want her, you should do something about it.”

 

Anders snorted and glared at the elf. “Why don’t you go home?” he asked testily. “My patient will be fine.”

 

Fenris gave him a rare grin and stood. “But will the healer?” he asked smugly, slinking past him. “I will return tomorrow to see her home.”

 

“No need,” Anders said as he walked away. Alone, he sat on the side of the rickety bed and pressed a hand to her forehead.  _ Still feverish _ , he thought, frowning.

 

Hawke murmured and turned her face to him. “Anders?” she asked.

 

“Yes. How do you feel?” he asked.

 

“With my fingers.”

 

He laughed, amazed at her ability to make a joke when she surely felt terrible. “Well yes, I suppose that’s true. Are you hungry?”

 

Hawke looked away, brow furrowed. “I don’t know. I think so?”

 

Anders nodded and patted her hand. “Stay here, I’ll warm up some soup.”

 

“Did you go out?”

 

“No,” he said, turning to clean off his work table and light the small brazier. “Sometimes patients bring food, if they have extra. I got some mostly fresh vegetables and made soup yesterday.”

 

She was quiet for a while, and he assumed she’d fallen back asleep. Humming to himself as he worked, he almost forgot she was there until she spoke again.

 

“I wish you’d come have dinner with Mother and me.” The words are tender through the rasp, and he turned to look at her in surprise. “If you won’t let me protect you, I could at least give you a decent meal.”

 

For a moment he couldn’t speak, he was in another time and place, talking with Warden-Commander Amell.  _ All I want is a pretty girl, a decent meal, and the right to shoot lightning at fools. _ He’d said those words before he met Justice, before he became...what he was.

 

And that simple desire had started this whole mess.

 

“Maybe sometime, sweetheart,” he said with empty cheer. “Tonight I’m the one feeding you.”

 

*

 

Dinner went poorly. Not because his soup was bad- it was quite good, in fact- but because the moment it hit her stomach she retched it back up, triggering a whole new level of misery. Hawke kept her head in a bucket most of the night, with Anders pouring soothing drinks down her throat in between bouts of sickness.

 

“Anders, please, just heal me,” she moaned, falling back on his pillow. “I can’t take this anymore.”

 

“Hawke, I told you, you’re too healthy not to fight this off,” he reminded her, while making her a warm drink to soothe her stomach. “It’s easy to forget that you’re not invincible, I know.”

 

“I’m pretty sure I’m aware of that fact,” she muttered.

 

With a small smile, he handed her a fragrant cup of tea. “Last one,” he promised, crossing his heart. “You’ll feel better in the morning, and I’ll take you home.”

 

“You could,” she said, stopping the cup halfway to her lips. “Or I could stay.”

 

Anders clenched his jaw and shook his head firmly and crossed his arms over his chest. “You should rest in your own bed. Healer’s orders.”

 

Once she was sleeping, he went out to the clinic, just staring into the darkness.  _ I can’t give her what she wants, _ he thinks, sitting and letting his head fall into his hands.  _ Before...Maker yes, before. I wouldn’t have hesitated. But I can’t give in to these feelings. _

 

**_I do not approve of this line of thought. You are obsessed._ **

  
Anders chuckled at Justice’s intrusion.  _ You may be an immortal Spirit of Justice, my friend, but I am a man.  _ He stood and went back to look in on her, sitting beside the bed and breathing in the scent of lavender that clung even through her sickness. “Sleep well, pretty girl.”


End file.
